Scribe Book School

Book publishing is currently at the beginning of the biggest shift since the rise of Amazon and self-publishing, and this episode explains both its present and future.

The goal is to help you choose the best publishing path for you and tell you exactly how to launch your book once you choose your publishing path.

In Part 1 of this episode, you'll learn what the current publishing landscape looks like right now.

In Part 2, you'll learn the new things we see some Authors doing by presenting case studies with exact numbers.

In Part 3, you'll learn how to pick the book publishing option that’s best for you. The truth is that there is no “right” publishing option; that all of them are right in different circumstances, and the “right” option depends on what you want to accomplish.

Then, in Part 4, you'll learn exactly how to think about marketing your book, and the launch strategies that we see working for Authors right now (both with and without platforms).

Want to write your book faster? Here are 8 simple tips to help you move through the writing process, beat writers’ block, and avoid many other common problems that  stand in a writer’s way.

If you’re a KDP Author and you’re wondering whether you should put your book in Amazon KDP Select, you’re not alone. It’s a complicated decision, and you could be leaving money on the table either way.

Amazon KDP Select gives you some special Kindle promotional tools, and enrolling your book is free. But, of course, there’s a catch: 

You have to enroll for a full 90-day period, during which Amazon has the exclusive right to sell your ebook.  

In other words, you can’t sell your own ebook on iBooks, Kobo, Nook, or anywhere besides Kindle for the next 90 days.  

So, is it worth it?  In this episode, we'll walk you through all the pros and cons of KDP Select for a self-published author of a non-fiction book.

Linkedin is a great marketing opportunity for authors. Because LinkedIn is a social media platform uniquely designed for professionals, it’s especially powerful for boosting your credibility, highlighting your relevant skills, reaching your target audience, and generating leads.

In this episode, I’ll explain how you can optimize your LinkedIn profile to make the most of your status as an author.

How you tell a story will make or break your book. 

A good story allows you to grab and hold the reader’s attention, teach them your ideas in an entertaining way, and relate those ideas back to their own lives. 

Vanity presses thrive on ripping off self-publishing authors. 

The good news is that you can avoid publishing scams with some basic knowledge about vanity publishing.  

This episode will explain what a vanity press is, what the risks are, and how to spot and avoid publishing scams. We’ll also talk about why people fall for those scams, which publishers to avoid, and how you should publish your book instead.

Many Authors want to get their book into hundreds (or even thousands) of bookstores across the country. It’s one of the most common dreams I hear from first-time Authors.

The #1 question we get, both from current and prospective authors, is this:

“How should I approach book marketing once it’s published?”

In this episode, we will cover the basics of how we teach our authors to market their business books.

When you’re marketing a business book, the most important thing you can do is frame your thinking around three core tenets:

1. Your book is a marketing tool—not the thing you market
2. Book marketing is a long term process—not a single event
3. No one cares about your book—they only care what your book gets them

As a self-published Author, you can use your book to get fantastic media coverage—including television and YouTube.

If you wrote the kind of book that can connect to your ideal audience through TV, this episode will give you tips for landing that coverage.

Non-fiction authors who can get book deal with a traditional publisher will need to write a “book proposal." 

You may have an important message, but it can’t make an impact if nobody hears it. 

In this lesson, #1 New York Times bestselling author, Tucker Max, breaks down how to use your book to get greater coverage in the media. 

Many authors forget the basic things they should be doing when their book is published. 

Consider this episode a checklist for when your book comes out, and spend the 60 minutes required to complete the following five actions to bolster your book’s success.  

Every author should use their book to land guest posts and contributor articles. 

Getting featured on major sites can attract new clients and business opportunities. 

In this episode, #1 New York Times bestselling author, Tucker Max, will teach you how to get guest posts with your book.

Every business owner knows what a pain client acquisition can be. 

A book doesn’t magically solve this problem, but it does make it much easier to both find and close new clients.  

One of the most common questions we get at Scribe is: “How do I get my book on a bestseller list?” 

Our standard answer: “You’d be better off by totally ignoring them.”  

We encourage our authors not to chase bestseller lists, but instead focus on the business and personal goals for their book. This confuses them initially (Having a bestselling book doesn’t get me more business?), but once we explain the process and tradeoffs to them, the overwhelming majority discard it and focus more on the goals that are far more impactful to them.  

In this episode, 4-time #1 New York Times bestselling author, Tucker Max, will cover everything you need to know about bestseller lists.

Think about your favorite authors—the ones whose books deeply affected your life. Do you know what all of them had in common?

None of them used special book writing software to write their book.

Yet, this is where many beginning and amateur writers start. They spend so much time searching for the “perfect” book writing software (among other tools) that will magically make their writing better.

Let me spare you time and money: software is not a relevant consideration for writing a great book.

If you’re stuck on finding the “perfect” software, something else is holding you back.

You know your book can translate into leads for your business... You just don’t know how. 

The answer is to use your book as a lead magnet.  

Most authors try to combine everything they know into one book. 

That’s the worst thing you can do. In this episode, you'll learn exactly what to do instead.  

One of the most common questions we get at Scribe is: 

“How do I get my book on a bestseller list?” 

Our honest answer? You’d be better off by totally ignoring them.  

In this episode, we will cover what you really need to know about bestseller lists. 

When we ask authors why they want to write a book, most of them focus on their branding or business goals. Those are legitimate goals, and books help greatly with both...

But those aren’t the only goals.

Many authors also want to achieve intangible goals, like “helping people” and “personal growth.”

They often mention them as an aside, almost as if they’re embarrassed about having these sorts of goals. As if it’s not appropriate for a business person to have emotions.

But when we talk to our authors after their books are out, they’re almost all impacted the most by these “intangible” benefits of their book.

Even though the business and branding aspects of books drive the economic return on investment and are thus important, we believe that the “intangible impacts” are what actually matter most to authors in the long run.

Why do I say that?

Because books help people make their lives better in ways far beyond what’s measured just by money.

That’s what this episode is all about. To help authors understand what the intangible benefits of a book can be, and to understand that it’s not only acceptable to want them—they’re often the point of writing a book.

Many authors are concerned with how cheaply they can publish a book. There is nothing wrong with wanting to save money, but if you are using your book as a credential to increase your authority, raise your visibility, or be a legacy piece, then DON'T be cheap!  

Every author struggles with how much of their personal story should be in their book. Some want to put a lot of their story in their book. Others don’t want to put any of their story in.

So how much is correct? The basic answer:

Your book should have enough of your story to help the reader get what they want out of the book, but nothing more.

In this episode, we'll look at the mistakes authors make with their story.

Before you listen to this episode, let me emphasize this point:

Most books do not need a foreword.

If you are unsure if your book needs a foreword, then it does not.

However, if you think it might, this episode is designed to help you think through whether it does, and if so, how to get one written.

If you want to get feedback, there is a right way to ask, and you should only ask specific people: Experienced writers and editors, experts in your specific field, or the audience you want your book to reach. Be very careful with asking friends and family to give you feedback!   

No matter what your book is asking readers to do next—especially if you’d like them to buy your products or services—it’s critical that the content of your book not only doesn’t sell, it educates and informs instead.  

There is only one hard and fast rule in writing:

Do what works for you.

That’s it.

In this episode, Hal and Charlie take questions from authors who are working on their memoirs.

You know why most readers—probably including you—skip book introductions?

Because most authors think the purpose of the introduction is to explain everything they will talk about in the book.

That is boring and wrong.

The purpose of a good introduction is to engage the reader and get them to read the book.

In this episode, you'll learn how to do just that.

We see authors spend years writing, finish the manuscript, and then spend virtually no time on the rest of the book. They essentially check out of the title, book cover, book description, etc.

This is utterly baffling. It’s like they never ask themselves possibly the most important question about their book: 

How do people judge my book?

By doing this, they’re essentially saying that they think readers will not judge their book by anything except the content. That the title, cover, author bio, blurbs and other marketing materials mean nothing to potential readers.

Let us lay this out for you in the starkest terms possible:

Almost every potential reader will judge whether or not to buy and read your book BEFORE they have read a single word inside the book.

This is not a pleasant fact, but it IS a fact, and the more you understand it, the better you can signal exactly what you want to the reader, so that they'll be engaged and give your content the time it deserves.

This episode will explain the three biggest judgments a reader makes during a buying decision about a book, and how to give your book the best chance to reach its potential reader.

Once you know what you’ll write about in your memoir, then you can move onto the next step: Creating a basic outline.

Your memoir outline will help you stay on track as you write.

Once you decide to write your memoir, the question of truth becomes very important–how much do you put it, and how do you even think about it.

In this episode, we will walk you through how to look at and think about truth in your memoir.

Want to access our entire Memoir course? 

The first thing most people think about when considering a memoir is what would happen if they published it. 

In this episode, Tucker will walk you through the implications of writing and publishing your memoir, and how to deal with it.

After the title and the book cover, your description is the most important book marketing material.

In this episode, we’ll walk you through how to write a book description, provide you a template (see below), and include good and bad book description examples.

Download our Scribe Book Description template, and let’s get started:

One of the most common questions we get from potential authors who are about to write a book is something along the lines of:

“How do I use my book to make money? How can I make sure I get an ROI on my time and money?”

The bad news is you will probably not make (substantial) money by selling copies of your book.

The good news: there are so many other ways you can make money with a book—and usually a lot more money than you’d make by focusing on selling copies.

Unless you’re a household name author (Steven King, JK Rowling, Malcolm Gladwell), most people buying your book won’t know who you are.

So how will they learn about you?

The author bio!

That’s what this episode will explain: how to properly write it, and why your author bio matters.

If you want to sell more books and get more media coverage, this is a must listen!

Congratulations! It feels amazing to get through the first draft of your book. Reward yourself with some time to rest and relax. The hardest part is over. You now have a real book in your hands, even if it’s rough.

When I say take some time to rest and relax, I’m very serious. Set the entire thing aside for at least a week, ideally two. This will give you a valuable fresh perspective when you come back and begin editing.

You’ve committed to write your book. Now it’s time to understand what is coming so you can prepare for your journey.  

In this episode, you will learn exactly what to expect during every single part of the journey, so you won't get stuck, you can push past your fears and setbacks, and get your book out into the world. 

If there is a unifying theme from all of Scribe's 600+ clients who have published their books, it's that they all say:

 "I am so happy I did this."  

Your book outline is the structure of your book, and thus incredibly important. If you start writing without a good outline template, the process will take forever and your book will be haphazard and incomplete.

Worse, having no outline often leads to not finishing your book at all.

In this episode, we’ll walk you through exactly how to pick the perfect book title — from how to think about book titles, how to pick yours, and how to test whether it’s the right one or not.

This is the most important marketing decision you can make for your book!

Just like companies that spend millions of dollars on naming new products, or media companies that test different titles for blog posts, you need to spend substantial time and energy finding a great title to ensure your book has the best possible chance of success.

Once you understand your book objectives, the next step is to understand exactly who your audience is for the book. This is because in order for your book to reach your objectives, it must appeal to an audience.  

In this episode, you’re going to learn how to choose and write out your book idea.

This is a part of the positioning process that you don’t have to get perfect at first, you just need to get something down that is in the right direction. You will have plenty of time to dial this is later on.

So don’t worry about having the perfect description, just get something down that answers the three questions we discuss in the episode.

There are two types of non-fiction books:

In this episode, you'll learn which book type is best for you right now.

In this episode, Tucker covers the top 13 author mistakes -- and how to avoid them. 

How do you overcome setbacks and doubt when you're starting out as a writer? No one knows better than Tucker Max, who was rejected by hundreds of publishers and agents before his writing career took off. 

Tucker is the author of four New York Times Best Sellers (three that hit #1), which have sold over 4.5 million copies worldwide. He's credited with being the originator of the literary genre, “fratire,” and is only the fourth writer (along with Malcolm Gladwell, Brene Brown, and Michael Lewis) to have three books on the New York Times Nonfiction Best Seller List at one time. He was nominated to the Time Magazine 100 Most Influential List in 2009.  

Tim Ferriss is one of Fast Company’s “Most Innovative Business People” and an early-stage tech investor/advisor in Uber, Facebook, Twitter, Shopify, Duolingo, Alibaba, and 50+ other companies. He is also the author of five #1 New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers: The 4-Hour Workweek, The 4-Hour Body, The 4-Hour Chef, Tools of Titans and Tribe of Mentors. The Observer and other media have named him “the Oprah of audio” due to the influence of his podcast, The Tim Ferriss Show, which has exceeded 400 million downloads and been selected for “Best of iTunes” three years running.  

Tucker Max is the co-founder of Scribe Media, a company that helps you write, publish, and market your book. He's written four New York Times Best Sellers (three that hit #1), which have sold over 4.5 million copies worldwide. He's credited with being the originator of the literary genre, “fratire,” and is only the fourth writer (along with Malcolm Gladwell, Brene Brown and Michael Lewis) to have three books on the New York Times Nonfiction Best Seller List at one time. He was nominated to the Time Magazine 100 Most Influential List in 2009.

You can absolutely write a book without caring who your audience is. But don’t expect it to do well.

In fact, there’s a name for a book that is written without an audience in mind—it’s called a diary.

If you want your book to be successful and reach the objectives you set out for it, you need an audience, and you need to think about and define that audience beforehand.

Let’s start with a definition of what an audience is (for the purposes of a book):

An audience is a single group of people that share the specific problem your book solves.

Why does this matter? Because the key to writing a good book is actually narrowing your audience down as much as possible to only the people your book is intended to help.

One of the most common questions we hear from potential authors is:

In this episode, we will cover the three main approaches we use. These work very well, and in fact, you can use each one to examine your book idea from different angles, and ensure that it’s the right book for you.

One of the most common questions we get from potential authors who are about to write a book is something along the lines of:

“How do I use my book to make money? How can I make sure I get an ROI on my time and money?”

It’s a reasonable question.

The bad news is you will probably not make (substantial) money by selling copies of your book.

The good news: there are so many other ways you can make money with a book—and usually a lot more money than you’d make by focusing on selling copies.

In this Scribe Guide, we'll cover 20 different ways you can leverage to turn your book into a profit-generating machine.